The specification relates to a social network. In particular, the specification relates to generating a ghost profile in a social network for users to participate in social networking activities without providing user information.
Social networks have become a popular tool for communicating with other people. Americans, for example, spend a quarter of their time online on social networks including blogs. Some people are concerned about creating profiles in social networks, however, because they are concerned that their privacy might be compromised. In addition, users do not want to take the time to fill out all their information and click multiple links to access information on a social network.
Thus a problem arises when users of social networks are friends with people that are opposed to social networks. The second group misses out on an important social component. For example, many users only share their photos on a social networking site. As a result, users that do not want to join the social network are forced to either join with reservations or miss out on the social component, such as viewing pictures.